


Happy Thoughts

by orphan_account



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Anal Sex, Depression, Drug Use, Eren Is a Little Shit, Eventual Smut, F/F, F/M, Fluff and Smut, Inspired by Shameless (US), M/M, Mental Health Issues, Oral Sex, Slow Build
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-01-04
Updated: 2018-01-04
Packaged: 2019-02-28 10:57:02
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,133
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13269996
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: Eren Jaeger is struggling to take care of his five siblings, trying his hardest to maintain sane, and questioning his sexuality all at once. Luckily, he finds a man willing to help him with all three of those issues.





	Happy Thoughts

**Author's Note:**

> I'm creating this fic because there's nothing better than not having _any_ of your others finished and piling more stories onto the others. 
> 
> And obviously this is based off of Shameless (U.S.).

“Eren, have you seen my phone?” 

Eren yelled out in pain as his hand grazed the side of the hot skillet that he was cooking breakfast on. He yanked his arm away from the stove top to cradle it to his chest and, accidentally, ended up knocking said skillet off of the stove and onto the floor. The three pancakes that had been cooking in the pan flew in separate directions; the first bouncing up and then back onto the floor, the second sticking an uncooked side to the oven door and the last landing on Eren’s foot.

With a swift kick, the pancake unstuck itself from Eren’s foot and joined the other one of the floor, “I have not. I’ve told you a million times to keep better track of your stuff. Do you remember where you set it last?” He scooped down and attempted to peel one of the pancakes off of the oven door. The only issue with that, was that they were still scalding hot and burned his fingers as soon as he attempted to grab one. Instead of addressing the pancake issue, he picked up the cooking pan and tossed it into the pile of dirty dished next to the sink. 

Mikasa walked into the kitchen, backpack thrown over one of her shoulders as she hurried around to find the rest of her stuff for school, “No. The whole idea of it being lost is not remembering where I set it last.” Without a word, she walked around the mess that was the area where Eren was fixing breakfast and sat at the dining table. She pulled out a thick textbook that had been issued by the school and flipped to a bookmarked page. She began reading almost instantly, and immediately, Eren knew that she had forgotten to do her homework.

“How many times have I told you to _not_ wait until last minute to finish your homework? You need to do it the night before,” Eren eventually succeeded in grabbing the pancake and he threw it into the trash, followed by the second and third one. After they were disposed of, he walked around the breakfast island built into their kitchen and eyed his younger sister with what would only be described as a grimace. “One day, you’re gong to get to school and you’re not going to have your homework done because you put it off for too long.”

“It’s not like I was putting it off,” she growled. “I just forgot that I had it.” Eren rolled his eyes at her explanation and roughed up her hair with his fingers. She furrowed her eyebrows in annoyance and smacked his hand away. Just after, a loud thud from the den signaled that Connie and Sasha had just ran down the staircase and had jumped the final five steps. 

Eren sighed and grabbed a hand towel from next to the sink. He briskly walked to the refrigerator and opened the the freezer side of it, pulling out a bag of frozen peas before wrapping them in the cloth. Sasha walked in moments later with her bright pink backpack dragging behind her on the floor and a blue sweater tied around her waist. After she had passed through the entryway, Eren held out the wrapped bag of peas and Connie grabbed them without question; pressing them to the side of his face where he had been punched the day earlier by a boy from school. 

“Mikasa forgot to do her homework,” Connie teased as soon as he saw his older sister bent over at the table. 

Mikasa’s head popped up. She grabbed her now empty backpack and chucked it at Connie, where he ducked last minute and dodged it. The green, torn up bag then flew straight into Eren and made him almost drop the large, overflowing plate of pancakes that he had made to feed everyone for breakfast.

He chose to ignore the flying-backpack-incident, “where is Jean and Armin?” Eren said as he set the pancakes onto the table. He spun on his heel and retrieved the silverware and plates that had been sitting on the counter top for everyone to use. As soon as he set them down onto the table, all of his siblings were grabbing their own with quick fingers and then filling their plates with more than they could eat. 

Eren left to go back into the kitchen and came back with two bottles of the cheapest maple syrup that they had at the grocery store and a stick of butter on a plate. 

Sasha grabbed seven pancakes as she responded, “I think that Armin is still sleeping, but I’m pretty sure that Jean snuck out last night.”

With that being said, Eren set down the food items a little too roughly, “what do you mean that he snuck out last night? And you didn’t tell me this _why_?”

Sasha shrugged.

“You’re a snitch,” came a sudden voice from the entry way, reveling a fully dressed Jean with a cigarette hanging out of his mouth. He walked past the kitchen and took his own place at the table and then took and drag, blowing the chemicals straight into Sasha’s face. He knew fully well how much she hated the smell of cigarette smoke, which was made even more evident from how she cringed and attempted to wave the smoke away. 

Eren went to the table to deliver the cups and yanked the cigarette from Jean’s mouth, “no smoking at the table. Now, go wake up your brother. You guys have not even,” he checked his watch, “ten minutes to finish your breakfast. You cannot wait until last minute like yesterday and run there. You will be late and none of you can take another tardy.” 

Jean mumbled something under his breath and shoved away from the table to go wake up Armin. As soon as he was out of the kitchen, Eren took a large drag from the cigarette and then put it out by squashing it onto Jean’s empty plate. 

“But you said-” Sasha started, but was shut up by the look that her older brother sent in her direction. 

Armin and Jean entered the kitchen just seconds later. Armin looked like he didn’t get any sleep at all the previous night, and Jean looked annoyed, per usual. 

“Were you up studying late last night?” Eren asked. He watched the blonde sit down at the table and help himself to the still quite full plate of pancakes, “or were you up reading like I told you not to?” Armin froze. 

“I’m getting to a very good part of my book,” the younger sibling offered, smothering his stack of pancakes with butter. 

“Can me and Sasha go to the skate-park after school?” Connie asked as he held out his mug for Eren. 

Eren hesitated,“yes- but you have to bring your helmet and _no_ going on the half-pipe. You almost broke your arm last time.” He grabbed the ceramic mug from his younger brother and walked back into the kitchen for the up-teenth time that morning. He set it down on the counter top before he began searching for the orange juice in the refrigerator. He moved the half-gallon of milk to the side and reached around a small container of packaged deli meat to grab the carton, “and that goes for you _too_ , Sasha.” He strode back to the table with the carton of orange juice in his left hand, the mug in his right and the half-gallon of milk cradled in his left arm.

Sasha pouted, “but that’s not fair! I didn’t almost-break my arm like Connie last time and I didn’t even get to go on it because Connie was too busy laying in the middle of it crying!” 

Her older brother set down Connie’s mug in front of him and then grabbed Sasha’s to fill with milk, “that doesn’t matter. You both should be careful when you’re out doing stuff like that. You can go on everything else, okay?” Eren caught a whiff of the milk that he was pouring into Sasha’s cup and nearly dropped the container, “and who left out the milk? This stuff’s supposed to be good for the next two weeks.”

“Probably Grisha,” Jean mumbled under his breath as he shoved a forkful of pancakes into his mouth. Everyone nodded.

“Speaking of Grisha, has anyone seen him recently?” Eren asked as he dropped the spoiled half-gallon into the trash can.

Mikasa looked up from her book, “he probably fell asleep at the bar like last time.” 

“Ten bucks, I bet that he’s in the neighbor’s trash can,” Connie said to Armin. 

“Well, I bet you twenty that he’s hanging out at the police station again,” Jean said, adding more maple syrup to his pancakes. Everyone glanced at him with a strange look and Connie sighed, grabbing the only twenty on himself and handing it to Jean because he knew that he was already right. 

Armin raised a hand, “ _actually_ , he’s sleeping under the tree in the backyard.” Connie snatched the twenty back with a wide grin, but Eren grabbed it out of his hand. 

Eren pocketed the money, “first of all, you cannot go around betting with _my_ money. Second, this is money I gave you the other day for that school field trip. Why didn’t you use it? Better yet, why the _fuck_ did you not go on that field trip?”

Connie groaned, “it was lame. We were going to go meet the mayor of the city and he’s a stuck up prick. I didn’t want to waste my day, and since I was already excused from all of my classes, me and Sasha went into town.” Sasha glared at her brother from across the table for ratting her out. 

“Oh,” Eren put his hands on his hips, “and where’s the twenty dollars that I gave _you_?”

“She lost it playing poker,” Connie yelled out in pain as Sasha slapped him on the arm, “why’d you hit me?!”

“You _asshole_!” Sasha cried, shoving away from the table to go grab her backpack from the floor on the other side of the room, “you promised that you wouldn’t tell!”

Connie shrugged, “I had my fingers crossed.”

“Okay everyone,” Eren started to clear the table of the now empty plates, silverware and half-full cups, “you all need to get to school.” He grabbed the plate that Armin was still eating off of and threw the rest of the pancakes into the trash despite Armin’s protests, “and no more betting with my money, Sasha,” he shot his sister a glare and then moved it over to his brother, “Connie.” 

Connie rolled his eyes and grabbed his backpack from the floor, followed by an Armin who was taking three pancakes to eat on the way. Jean didn’t budge from where he was sitting because he was too busy on his phone, texting someone, to realize that Eren was ushering them all out of the door so they wouldn’t be late. 

Mikasa was the last one to exit through the door, walking extremely slow as she continued to read from her textbook. When she accident walked into the doorway on her way out, Eren decided that enough was enough and took the book from her, slammed it shut, and handed it back. She groaned at this but didn’t reopen the book in front of her older brother. Only when she was outside of the house and out of his sight, did she reopen her science book and continue to read. 

Once Armin, Connie, Sasha and Mikasa were out of the house, Eren sighed in relief and flopped down onto the couch with no grace whatsoever. Maybe he could catch a few hours of sleep until they got back. 

Just the thought made him smile.

He was about to shut his eyes when he caught sight of Jean still sitting at the kitchen table. Lucky for Jean, Eren was no longer going to stand up and yell at him due to how tired he was, so he just settled for calling out, “you should get to school, Jean.”

“Fuck off, _Eren._ ”

Eren slammed his hands down on the sides of the couch and lifted himself up, “you’re going to fucking school, Jean. I’m not asking you to, I’m telling you to.” He stood up and wiped not-so-invisible dirt off of his jeans with the palms of his hands. He would have to get on Connie about building dirt-castles on the furniture.

“Since when did you become my fucking mom?” Jean stood up from the dining table and began to walk towards the staircase that led to his shared room with Armin and Connie. Eren stepped in front of his path and Jean tried to shove his way past his older brother, however, Eren wasn’t in the mood to fight and shoved him back from walking up the stairs.

“You’re going to school.”

There was a long moment where the two siblings just stared at each other, jaws clenched and bodies taught before Jean sighed and threw up his hands in defeat. “Fine, I’ll go to fucking school. Jesus fucking Christ, dude. Lay off of it a bit. You’re starting to sound like mom when she actually cared.” He moved away from Eren and tossed his backpack haphazardly over his shoulder and pushed open the front door with more force than necessary, leaving Eren standing in the living room with a look of shock on his face. 

He crossed back and forth to the couch twice; pacing, before he had a sudden realization and ran to the door. As soon as he opened it, his beliefs were true.

“School is in the other direction, Jean!”

Jean turned around from where he was walking away towards the subway station, flipped his brother off with both hands and took off jogging in the direction he originally was going; ignoring Eren completely and taking off to god-knows-where. He took off his backpack after a few paces and tossed it into a garbage can that was next to the homeless guy that was always hanging out on the block. Correction, that wasn’t the homeless guy that was always hanging out, it was Grisha- which contradicted Armin’s earlier claim that he was in the backyard. 

Instead of chasing after Jean, Eren slammed the front door shut, jogged down the stairs and then across the street. He already knew that he was passed out from a night of drinking, it didn’t take a genius to realize that Grisha wasn’t conscious- let alone, sober. The man didn’t just casually lay down to take a nap on the dirty sidewalk. He would have to drink enough to pass out when he was still standing and fall to the ground. 

Grisha didn’t stir as Eren approached him, and he still didn’t wake up even when his oldest son kicked his leg once, twice, and then for a third time. If it was anyone else, Eren would be concerned for them to be suffering from an overdose or alcohol poisoning. The only difference was that this was Grisha, and that was enough of an explanation for anyone. 

“Wake up you old lazy fuck,” Eren grabbed him by the back of the shirt and yanked him up into a sitting position. When his father still wasn’t awake, he sighed, took a deep breath, looked around to make sure that their were no questioning eyes, and began to drag the man across the street back to the house. On the way, a slow moving car honked extremely loudly at the two men and Eren yelled a few profanities at the red Impala. The car skidded as it sped around them, almost hitting Grisha’s unconscious body (not that Eren would’ve complained if that had been the case. It would be helping a lot of people.)

As soon as he reached the stairs, Eren gritted his teeth and yanked Grisha up the first stair. A loud, hollow _thud_ cascaded through the somewhat quiet city air when the practically empty head of Eren’s father hit the wood board of the first. Eren made it up a few more before he realized that a familiar face from his high school years was walking down the sidewalk and opening the rusty, squeaky gate that led to the Jaeger household.

“Hey, Hanji!” Eren spoke happily, dropping Grisha and allowing him to fall back down to the yard and hit his head on every single stair, “how’ve you been? I haven’t seen you in months!” He walked down the stairs and stepped over the body blocking the bottom. Smiling brightly, he approached Hanji and pulled her into a quick embrace. 

Hanji laughed and slapped her hand on Eren’s back, “I moved back into the old house I used to live in down the street and I’m doing great, how about you?” She pulled back and pulled her signature move of kissing her old friend’s cheek. 

“As good as someone can get in this house,” the two laughed at the accuracy of such a statement. “But yeah, I’m great. Had to drop out last year, though, but there’s nothing I can really do about it. It was kind of a family thing.” After saying this, Eren felt his throat tighten a bit. He hated addressing the fact that he had dropped out; he felt that saying he was a high school drop out was shameful and embarrassing. 

Hanji smiled sadly and squeezed Eren’s arm comfortably. Since she didn’t want to build a conversation off of the touchy subject of Eren dropping out, she quickly changed the subject, “how’s the kids?” 

Eren wanted to laugh, “Connie keeps getting into trouble -real surprise there- Sasha’s been playing poker with teenagers in the park, Mikasa’s forgetting to do her homework, Armin’s staying up past midnight to read and Jean has been sneaking out late at night and saying that he doesn’t want to go to school anymore,” he chuckled, “what do you think?” Wiping his hands on his jeans, he sighed and looked around the yard, “do you want to come in for a bit to catch up? I got this really good hot chocolate from the store the other day that the kids haven’t found yet.” 

Laughing, Hanji shook her head, “it’s tempting, but I should really get back home. The reason that I moved back was to take care of my brother.” She adjusted the purse that was hanging off of her shoulder.

Eren looked slightly shocked, “really? How old?” He had never known that Hanji had a brother. 

“Seventeen.”

He looked even more shocked now since he was around the same age as Hanji’s brother, but didn’t need cared for. The first thing that came to his mind was the thought that the kid might be handicapped or unable to care for himself.

“He’s been in and out of juvie since he was eight,” Hanji sighed, “I don’t want him to get into any more trouble with the law so I’m moving back for a bit to try to get him to go back to school and on the trail to success.” She said the last bit with a heavy amount of sarcasm, “yeah, like that’s ever going to happen. In reality, I just don’t want him ending up with life in the joint.”

Eren nodded, “understandable.” 

Hanji started to walk backwards down the sidewalk, “rain-check on that hot chocolate?”

“If the kids don’t find it, definitely.”

Smiling, Eren’s old friend started off down the street, stopping to wave once before disappearing in the same direction that Jean had gone in. 

“Lovely reunion,” came a sudden voice behind Eren, making the latter jump in surprise and spin around on his heel. 

Grisha was propped up against the stairs, pushing around an empty beer bottle lying on the ground with what appeared to be just a little bit of beer left in the bottom that was a few months old, “girlfriend of yours?” 

Eren snorted, “no. Friend of mine from high-school.” He stepped over one of his father’s legs and jogged up the staircase. 

“Mind giving your father a hand?” He extended it out towards his son.

“Yes, I mind very much,” Eren opened up the door to the house and slammed it shut behind himself.

“Is that anyway to treat your loved, devoted father?!” Eren heard him yell from the outside of the house, where he was still most likely propped up against the staircase and not moving. The first thing that came to mind was _”yes,”_ but he held his tongue and decided that retaliation wasn’t the best option. Instead, he began to pick up the house before the kids got back from school- starting with the huge pile of dirty laundry on the couch that all of the kids had compiled there sometime before they left for school. 

There was a loud thud from outside, followed by three others and then the front door flying open. Grisha was hanging onto the door handle with both hands but still lying on the ground, obviously not sober- not that he was at any other time of the day. 

“Is there any beer left in the fridge?” Grisha finally stood, but wobbled and had to hold onto railing of the staircase dangerously tight so he didn’t fall. He coughed loudly and hobbled his way to the kitchen, not minding to shut the door behind himself. Eren, obviously annoyed by his father’s behavior, shut the door for him, or more so, slammed. 

Eren grabbed a plastic laundry basket off of the floor and began to fill it with clothing that was strewn about, “no, we haven’t bought any in a while because the last time that we did, you drank it all in one sitting and threw up on Connie’s science project that had taken him a month to complete.” He grabbed a pair of jeans and pulled the legs right-side out before tossing them into the laundry container.

Grisha blew off Eren’s statement with a dismissing hand movement and started to walk into the kitchen. He walked out moments later, pulling his right hand out of his pocket and before he could walk back out the door, Eren stopped him and held out his hand. He wasn’t in the mood to deal with his father today.

“That money is for groceries this week, hand it over.”

Looking shocked, Grisha stepped backwards with his hand threw over his heart, “I’m offended that you would ever think so low of me; that I would ever steal the money that you worked so hard for, for something so small like an alcoholic beverage.” He attempted to walk around Eren, “that’s absolutely shameful. You should have more trust in your father.” 

Eren grabbed Grisha by the back of his shirt, reached into his pocket, and pulled out the roll of cash that he had hidden in the cupboard the night before after work from his dad’s pocket. As soon as he had revealed it and held it up, Grisha faked a look of complete surprise. 

“How did that get there? Did I accidentally put on a pair of your jeans?” To make his lie more believable, he patted down his pants and sighed, “yep, I think these are your’s. Sorry about that.”

“Those are your pants,” he shoved his money into his own pocket, “and this is _my_ money. You can waste your own money on alcohol.”

As Eren passed him back into the living room, Grisha followed his movements with thrown up hands in exasperation, “is that any way to speak to your father of nineteen years?” 

“Yes,” he continued to pick up the clothing of his siblings that had been thrown all over the living room floor and furniture. He picked up a shirt that was hanging off of the single lamp sitting next to the couch, smelled it, gagged, and tossed it into the laundry basket by his feet. “Now, you can either help with laundry or leave and stop bothering me.”

“I am not bothering you,” there was the sound of the cupboard door slamming shut, which was obviously from Grisha searching for more cash, “and I think that I deserve my fair share in that money. I contribute to this family just as much as you and it’s important that I have enough money to survive on the streets.” Grisha walked back into the kitchen and put his hands on his hips, “I think that giving your father enough money for a beverage down at the Survey Corps is being a good, caring son.”

“Not gonna happen.”

...

When Hanji unlocked her front door, she had to ram her shoulder into it three times before it popped open and practically made her fall onto the floor. After she stood back up fully, hung up her coat and dropped her keys into a small container near the door, did she realize that her brother was sitting on the couch, eating a bowl of cereal and watching her with a bored expression.

“It’s actually _slightly_ surprising to me that you _didn’t_ just break the lock on our door,” he shoveled a spoonful of Cheerios into his mouth, his expression not changing at any point as his sister walked out of the entryway.

Hanji tossed her purse onto the opposite end of the couch of her brother, “it was already ruined before we moved in because of all of the homeless people that had broken in,” she plopped down onto the old recliner that was parallel to the sofa, “Levi, did we go grocery shopping last Friday or did we forget?” Her voice was not so much questioning as it was exasperated since she already knew the answer.

“We? I didn’t forget shit. That was all you,” Levi stood up from the couch and walked through the doorway that led to the kitchen, “not that I didn’t try to remind you to go pick up some crap from the grocery store.” He drank the milk that was remaining in his cereal bowl before he set it down into the empty sink for it to be washed at a later time. Stretching, he walked back out to the living room, “and I’m not really in the mood to deal with all of the cock-suckers down at Walmart, so I’d appreciate it if _you_ would go so I don’t knock in some fucker’s teeth.” 

Rubbing at her face, Hanji sighed, nodded, but didn’t move from the reclining chair. She was simply just too tired to go fill her brother’s request at the moment, so she settled with _maybe_ going after an hour or two long nap. She was tired, slightly irritable (and possibly homicidal) as well as completely broke from buying back their old house. In all honestly, Hanji was ready to throw in the rag and be done with the day. Only, life didn’t work like that. As soon as she was back up and awake, she would be continuing on with this shit show for as long as it was needing to be dealt with. 

She would probably have to pay Eren another visit soon and ask him how he was _functioning_ with having to work around so much chaos… And Hanji thought that _her_ life was difficult. Imaging having to live a life similar to Eren’s, where your siblings came first in all situations, you had no high school diploma and you couldn’t hold a steady job because you _didn’t_ graduate, was too hard for her to even begin to think of. To add, her friend had to take care of five kids without nearly any money and the one parent that, as Hanji remembered from the stories Eren used to tell her back in high school, still _was _present, was too drunk most of the time to be considered a suitable guardian. The thought of ever having to pull through a situation like that sent shivers down Hanji’s spine.__

__Levi crossed his arms over his chest and leaned against the doorway, “so… where were you just a second ago? Paying someone a visit?”_ _

__“Yes,” Hanji didn’t want to bicker with her brother so she kept it short and sweet in hope that he wouldn’t try to drag on the conversation._ _

__He apparently either didn’t pick up on her annoyed tone or just didn’t care because he decided to press, “who was it? Got a boyfriend I didn’t know about?”_ _

__“No,” she sat up in the chair and threw Levi a look, “and even if it _was_ , there’s no fucking way that I would ever tell you. You’d probably go over to his house and cut off his dick while he was sleeping.”_ _

__Levi snorted and rolled his eyes, “don’t be so ridiculous,Hanji…” He smiled, knowing that he was going to say something either stupid or clever, “ there’s no promise that I would be able to break into his house in the first place.” After the words left his mouth, he was rewarded with his older sister chucking a pillow at him that had been on the floor next to the chair._ _

__“Shut up,” she laughed._ _

__“But really,” Levi interrupted the small amount of happiness that Hanji had been experiencing, “who did you go see?”_ _

__Once again, she kept it short and sweet, “a close friend of mine- from my high school years.”_ _

__“Oh,” he pushed off of the frame of the kitchen door, “so you friend-zoned the kid? Wow, that’s disappointing-” he raised his hands in surrender and defense at his sister’s glare, “for him, of course. I couldn’t be happier that you aren’t banging some high school sweetheart. That shit doesn’t happen in real life.” Sniffing, he felt down his front pockets, obviously not finding what he was looking for, “hey, you got a smoke?”_ _

__Hanji leaned back against the recliner, putting her hands behind her head in an attempt at comfort, “my purse; left pocket- and don’t take any of my fucking cash, you dick. I know exactly how much I have in there.” Before Levi asked for it, she reached into her back pocket, pulled out her lighter and tossed it to him._ _

__Levi walked over to the couch where the purse had been tossed and opened it, not before pocketing the bright-blue lighter, “oh?” He smiled to himself, obviously amused, “ and how much is that?”_ _

__“Forty dollars- a twenty and two tens.”_ _

__“Well,” he zipped up the purse and tossed it to her, “I needed some cash so now you have two tens and _no_ twenty.” _ _

__Hanji didn’t argue due to her exhaustion, “whatever, just pay me back.”_ _

__With a lazy salute, Levi rolled his eyes, “yes, ma’am.”_ _


End file.
